Pearl Jam Raising Veterans Voices

Pearl Jam to help fund ‘Veterans’ Voices’ project
The Recorder
Diane Broncaccio
Recorder Staff
August 26, 2016

“The Veterans’ Voices program takes participants out of the broken places, the darkness, the hopelessness.” Robin Lane

SHELBURNE FALLS — For 15 years, rock musician/singer-songwriter Robin Lane of Shelburne Falls has been using music to help people recover emotionally from sexual assault, child abuse or domestic violence. Through her nonprofit, Songbird Sings, Lane has also worked with military veterans, using music to help soldiers reconnect to feelings that have been numbed by war trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder, addiction and mental health problems.

This summer, “Veterans’ Voices” will get extra help from the proceeds of two Pearl Jam concerts held this summer in Boston’s Fenway Park.

Veterans’ Voices is one of four local programs picked by Pearl Jam’s Vitalogy Foundation to receive $1 for every ticket sold for the Fenway Park concerts held on Aug. 5 and 7. The Pearl Jam donation is to be followed by another contribution to be made by “The Foundation to be Named Later,” (FTBNL), which provides ongoing support to Songbird programs.

According to Vitalogy, the Fenway baseball park concerts broke attendance records with 72,722 tickets sold over two nights. That means Songbird Sings will receive $18,180.

“The funding provided … will be used to create songwriting workshops for veterans with PTSD and will allow Songbird Sings to expand programming and reach more survivors, in order to ease suffering caused by PTSD,” Lane said, in a news release. “A huge thanks to Pearl Jam and FTBNL for their support. We couldn’t be more grateful.”
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